


Until My Dying Day

by DreamsComeTrue (toomucherin)



Category: Figure Skating RPF
Genre: Angst, F/M, Mentions of Cancer, Possible Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-16
Updated: 2018-06-16
Packaged: 2019-05-24 03:35:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,154
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14946839
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/toomucherin/pseuds/DreamsComeTrue
Summary: It was just a headache...(Tumblr prompt ficlet)





	Until My Dying Day

**Author's Note:**

> I'm stuck sick in the hospital, and my friend gave me an evil prompt to pass the time, so this happened. I'm so sorry. 
> 
> (Prompt: Okay finish the story. Tessa is admitted to the hospital. Scott comes to visit and see what's wrong. Doctor pulls him aside and tells him she has only a few weeks to live, but she doesn't know yet. Scott sees her and says...)
> 
> I tweaked a little, because my immediate response was obviously they're married if the doctor gave him information before Tessa or her family... and this is what happened.
> 
> Again, really sorry. But not sorry enough to not post it, apparently.

Scott stood in the doorway of the hospital room observing Tessa before crossing the threshold and alerting her of his presence. She had fallen asleep after the pain meds they had given her kicked in, and it gave him some small comfort to see her face that had been so filled with distress now relaxed, her breathing slow and even for the first time all morning. Even in the generic green hospital gown that swallowed her figure, a nasal cannula running under her nose, across her cheeks, and under her chin, wires pocking out from multiple places, monitoring her, giving her fluids, doing who knows what else… she was still the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. 

He let out a slow, heavy sigh, running his hands through his hair. He’d been meaning to cut it, but he knew she liked it long… how could he cut it now, when… well, cutting it was out of the question for the foreseeable future. 

How had they ended up here? Things were good, they were good. Really good. After officially announcing their retirement (again) the year after Pyeongchang, they had been thriving. Their Thank You Canada Tour evolved into the world tour they had always dreamed of, it seemed like they lived out of suitcases for three years straight. And then they had finally decided it was time to have roots again. The arrival of baby Charlotte forcing their hands in some ways, including the casual reveal that they’d been married since the fall of 2018. They’d settled back in London, they’d been talking about buying the Ilderton rink and renovating it and opening their own training center… they had so many plans… so much they still wanted to do.

It was just a headache. Just a bad headache. Maybe some mood swings. And then the forgetfulness. And then the… spell this morning, that scared him half to death and brought them to the emergency room via ambulance. Seizure they said. Tumor. Brain tumor. They needed to do a biopsy to be sure but it didn’t look promising. Likely aggressive, rapid decline, poor prognosis. The doctor had filled his head with a lot of words and Scott wasn’t sure any of them had actually processed through his brain. It had just been a headache. 

With another sigh, he made his way into the room and sunk into the chair by her bed, squeezing her hand and running a finger down her face. Her eyes fluttered open at his touch, still glassy from the medications they’d given her. 

“Hey T,” he whispered, stroking her temple slowly. She saw confusion building in her eyes as she began to take in her surroundings. The doctors had warned him that after the seizure and the medications they’d given her, she’d probably have some short-term memory loss. “We’re in the hospital, babe.” As her eyes came to focus, he saw the moment her senses came back to her and her panic filled her eyes. “Lottie’s with my mom, she’s fine, babe, she’s safe.” He whispered the reassurance in her ear before placing a kiss to her temple.

“What… what happened?” she finally whispered, her voice hoarse. 

“You had a seizure.” He opened his mouth to elaborate but found he couldn’t find the words. “We, uh.. we called an ambulance and brought you here,” he finished, trailing off. 

“Oh.” Scott wasn’t sure how much of his words she was processing, her eyes still coming in and out of focus. She was silent for a long moment, eyes closed, and he briefly thought she had fallen back asleep before she whispered again, “my head hurts so much, Scott.”

“I’ll, um, here, I’ll call your nurse for some more pain medicine,” he replied, fumbling for the remote the nurse had shown him earlier. He felt Tessa’s hand covering his, and he looked back up at her.

“Is it safe for Lottie? Do they know I’m still breastfeeding?”

And suddenly he was sobbing. Big, wet, ugly sobs that racked his whole body. His wife was dying and all she cared about was taking care of their daughter. their sweet, beautiful daughter, who wasn’t even going to remember her mom, and how was he supposed to do this alone, he wasn’t prepared to do this alone, he wasn’t programmed to do this alone. 

“Scott?” Tessa’s soft voice pulled him back to his present situation. Scott pulled both of her hands into his, doing his best to pull himself together.

“Lottie’s just fine, sweetheart, she’s going to be just fine, okay? But let’s take care of you for now.” 

“Okay.” she sighs, closing her eyes again. “My head really hurts.”

“I know it does, I know.” Scott returns one hand to her temple, stroking it slowly, pressing the big red button the nurse had shown him earlier on the remote with his other, sending a silent prayer she would answer quickly. 

A few minutes later their nurse slipped in quietly, reaching behind him to cancel the light and whispering “what can I do for you?”

“Um, she woke up and said she’s in pain?”

“Let me check and see what I can give her, okay?”

“Yeah, that’d be… okay, yeah.”

The nurse paused, taking a closer look at him. “Is there anything I can get you? Water? Tea? Someone I can call to sit with you?”

“Um, no… no, our parents are with our daughter and I… I don’t really know what to say to anyone right now.”

A sad frown filled her face, and she placed a soft hand on his shoulder. “Let me know if you change your mind, okay? I can also page our chaplain for you if you’d like to talk to someone… just let me know. It can sometimes help, having someone to talk to.”

“Just… just the meds for now, I think.”

“Of course, I’ll be right back,” she whispered before slipping out again.

A few minutes later the grimace lines on Tessa’s face had smoothed over again, and Scott breathed a small sigh of relief knowing at least his wife wasn’t hurting anymore. 

He knew he needed to call his parents back. He knew he had multiple text messages to respond to. He knew they had so many decisions to make. He knew he was going to have to figure out how to tell Tessa what was going on, and his family.

But for this moment, he was just going to hold his wife’s hand, stroke her face, and memorize every feature and line all over again. And if there were tears streaming down his face, no one needed to know. And if his heart was shattering on the floor of this hospital room, he was just going to have to learn how to live without out, because his entire heart was laying in this hospital bed and he wasn’t sure he was ever going to feel whole again.

**Author's Note:**

> I don't have any immediate plans to continue this, but I suppose I COULD


End file.
